


He Called Your Name Before He Went

by laraceleste



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Alternate Universe - Percy Jackson Fusion, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Daughter of Hermes!Marrnette, F/M, Half Blood!Marinette, Identity Reveal, Inspired by Orpheus and Eurydice (Ancient Greek Religion & Lore)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-10
Updated: 2019-12-10
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:00:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21692674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/laraceleste/pseuds/laraceleste
Summary: Marinette Dupain-Cheng would do anything for her partner, including and not limited to: walking into Hades sans a Miraculous willing to make any deal nessicary in order to bring him back.
Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug, Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug & Nino Lahiffe
Comments: 10
Kudos: 169





	He Called Your Name Before He Went

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the Hadestown song Wait For Me.

Adrien Agreste had imagined death so often after receiving his miraculous some nights he woke up in bed thinking he was nothing more than a ghost, haunting the plane of the living. Sometimes- late at night, long after Plagg had fallen asleep, when he couldn't quite manage to drift off himself, and the weight of the world pressed heavily down on his chest -he would imagine he'd die for his city- his lady -in a blaze of glory; that he'd take a hit from an akuma for his lady and he'd fall to his death at the base of the Eiffel Tower. A death fit for it's city's hero. Sometimes he'd imagine it would be Hawkmoth that killed him, in a fight to death the pair of them- detransformed and with Paris in ruin in the backdrop -would come to blows leaving neither standing when the fighting finished.

He never imagined he'd die like this. In some random dirty Parisian alleyway, bleeding out because he hadn't been quick enough to give some mugger what they'd wanted.

He never imagined fading way, leaving his bug with a million and one questions on where he went and what had happened to him and why he had just left her because he hadn't, he wouldn't-not ever, not willingly.

He never imagined being murdered.

"Kid," Plagg begged, his voice panicked, Adriens heavy eyes fought to stay open, "You have to stay awake Ladybug will be here soon-I-Ladybug!" Adriens head lulled to the side.

Standing there in the rain with water rolling over her magical suit and her hair sticking to her face was the love of his life. His lady.

Though it pained him, just like always his heart sped up at the mere sight of her.

He smiled, it was faint and looked more like a grimace but as Ladybug rushed to him, Plagg on the other, and cupped his cheek Adrien decided that if this was how he died it would be okay because she was there with him, by his side.

"Adrien-Chat," she whimpered her lip quivered and she gathered him in her arms, close to her and stood up, her knees wobbled underneath them. "Just hold on please. Just a little longer. Please. Everything's going to be okay, I'll get you to a hospital and the doctors will f-fix you up and-and-"

She was crying; her tears were a warm contrast to the icy raindrops hitting his skin. There was a weight sitting on his chest, a burning in his lungs that he just wanted to stop and a voice in the back of his head, one that sounded like his mothers soothing voice told him just how to do so.

It was easy.

_Just close your eyes and let go._

It took more effort than he'd ever admit to but he lifted his hand and cupped her cheek, her blue eyes- Nino had once asked him what his faviorte color was and though he had simply said blue it was that shade of bluebell blue he loved so dearly -met his green.

"Ladybug."

"Please don't—" she sobbed. Her knees buckled and collided with the hard concrete. "Don't leave me." A flash of pink and suddenly it wasn't just Ladybug holding him— begging him not to go —it was Marinette Dupain-Cheng. 

A blur of red zipped over his head to Plagg. 

His Princess, the only person who could ever compete with the feelings he had for Ladybug. The love of his life. A soft look overtook Adriens features.

His thumb traced over her cheekbone. Marinette, he thought, his heart beat to the name, his lungs struggled to fill with air but Marinette made it seem effortless.

The sweetest person he knew, the kindest and best and smartest.

"Marinette," he breathed. _I love you._

And he died; there was no profound crescendo of music, no well timed clap of thunder or bolt of lighting, nothing but the heartbreaking cry of a girl losing the boy she so dearly loved.

...

Tom Dupain had raised Marinette, he had taught her how to ride a bike and how to bake bread and brownies and he had taught her how to laugh when she wanted to cry but he was not her father. No her father was more than a baker, more than a mayor or zookeeper and so much more than just some fashion mogul, he was the protector of thieves and travelers and the lucky, the Olympian who still wore tube socks because all mailman wore tube socks, and had two living-talking snakes wrapped around the attena of his phone because despite the modern times he was still struggling to move past dial-up.

Her father was the Greek God Hermes.

She had met him once, a few summers before she had gotten her earrings, back when she and her siblings and cousins had fought for their lives- fought for an unknowing world -against the Titan who wore her brothers face.

And there he was again, outside the gate of the cemetery wearing a black mailman uniform, a box wrapped neatly in unmarked brown paper tucked neatly under his arm.

Marinette had been tucked under Ninos arm, Alya under his other, when she saw him, a deadpan expression on his face and a heavy look in his eyes.

They were the same color blue as hers; the same color her brothers eyes had once been. Marinette looked at the ground for a moment, her brothers face burned in her memory.

Marinette turned to Nino, her eyes rimmed red and the Black Cat Miraculous tucked under the neckline of the black dress she'd worn. She couldn't risk wearing it around her finger— not because people might recognize that the ring had once belonged to the boy they were wearing —but because she knew if she slipped the ring onto her right hands fourth finger there was no way she wouldn't wish for Adrien to come back; but she also wasn't about to stick Plagg back into the Miraculous box for another life time, leaving him to stew in his grief all alone.

"I'll meet you back at my house," she muttered. She could feel Tikki beneath her coat, hidden in the bust of her dress; the kwami tensed. Marinette knew what Tikki thought she was going to do; it was why Ladybug and the Black Cat holders were never supposed to be the Guardian. She didn't judge the godling, but the weight on her heart increased. It hurt to breath; every intake of breath was a struggle.

"What?" Alya latched onto her friends wrist, 

"I need to talk to someone I know-don't wait up," she told the pair, twisting her wrist out of her best friends grasp. 

The pair hesitated for a moment, watching Marinette stumble in the direction of the mailman before turning away and walking towards the closed Dupain-Cheng pastry.

Marinette pulled the coat she'd made two winters ago tighter around herself a cool fall wind blew past her.

Sabine Cheng had always said when she'd met Hermes he had appeared in the bar near the college she had been attending. Sabine, when Marinette had gotten older, after her first summer at camp, had mused that with all the audacity and swagger and arrogance that only a member of the Greek pantheon could possess smiled at her so blindingly her head had gone fuzzy because whilst maybe he wasn't Aphrodite under the tavern lights and certainly under the moon light he had been the most beautiful man she'd ever seen up until that point.

Tom Dupain and his warm smile had eclipsed the god four years later but at that moment a young Sabine Cheng couldn't think of anyone more beautiful than Hermes had been.

"Hey dad," Marinette said. Hermes was not the most beautiful man Marinette had ever seen, Adrien had always been able to claim that title. Would always claim that title.

Marinette felt her lip wobble violently. Tikki peaked out from the neckline of Marinettes dress.

"Lord Hermes," the Ladybug kwami greeted solemnly.

"Tikki," he nodded respectfully. Hermes, despite the fact he could look however he so wanted too, looked like any middle aged father, he had crows feet in the corner of his eyes and smile lines that ran deeper than any river Marinette could possibly name off her head and patches of grey scattered around in his hair. "Please let Plagg know I'm sorry." Tikki, wordlessly blinked.

"I will, thank you." She than once more disappeared from view.

Hermes wrapped his free arm around Marinettes shoulders and pulled her against him; "Hey pumpkin." Marinette's arms wound around his middle like ivy vines; she clung to him tightly as a new round of fresh tears began to rack her body. It wasn't fair, Adrien had been good. He had been a hero, his life had never been easy he deserved happiness, he deserved to be loved and cherished and it didn't matter if it wasn't Marinette who he wanted to spend his life with in the end— she didn't care if he never wanted to see her again —because all that she cared about was that he was happy and safe and loved.

He was still beloved— by her and her family, by Nino and Alya and the rest of their friends and by his father —but he wasn't happy or safe and it wasn't fair. 

It was bullshit.

"I-I I miss him," she sobbed, her voice raw and high pitched and she could feel her fathers nails bite into her through her jacket as he clutched her closer to his chest.

"I'm sorry," Hermes said, "I'm so sorry pumpkin." Marinette looked up at her father, he was tall and wiry like all of her brothers and his shoulders seemed to end pointedly. The wind blew once more and tousled his brown hair.

"Why would the fates take him away from me?" Marinette had been a hero since she was a child, she had helped save the world when she had been eleven; she constantly saved Paris and the universe on a day-to-day basis, and she knew one day she'd die. She knew she'd probably never get to live to be her mothers age or have the three children she dreamed about in Physics class but she had, had him and that had been enough. 

So why had the Fates taken him away? What had she done to anger them?

"I-" Hermes sighed, "I don't know. I've been around for thousands of years and still have no idea why the Fates do what they do."

"It hurts," she told him. Chat Noir had died once before, back when they had just began their lives as Superheros and it had hurt back than too— it had felt like part of her had been ripped out from the inside of her —but she had gotten him back. She had saved him. Why hadn't she been able to save him this time? Why could she help save the world from a titan, why could she save the world from monsters made up by a mad-man but not her partner from some average day mugger?

"I know pumpkin, I-it's why I'm here." Marinette pulled back ever so slightly and looked up at her father, her eyes were bloodshot— Ladybug red —and her nose had an unblown snot bubble caught just before the opening of her nostril. Her face was blotchy and she was still shaking, more heartbroken sobs ready to burst from her at the drop of a hat.

"What?" Hermes paused, his lips pressed together and he looked up at the cloudy sky, looking as if he half expected his father to part the clouds himself and come down.

"How far would you go for him—your partner?"

"To the end of time," Marinette said, she didn't hesitate, "To the end of the Earth." She would do anything for him. She wanted to do everything; that night when Plagg and Tikki had lead her home, still covered in Adriens blood and her only thought was how the Miraculous could bring him back Plagg, more understanding than she had deserved had asked her if she thought Adrien could live with himself if she brought him back. He knew the coast, knew someone else would've had to die and _'Do you think Adrien would be okay with that?'_

No, he wouldn't have been. He would have been furious, he'd hate her and himself— doing what they had spent the past four years stopping from Hawkmoth from achieving would be tantamount to spitting on his grave —and he'd do whatever he could to fix the situation. 

With a dry smile Hermes tucked Marinette under his arm. "Got a ticket?" he punned. It was stupid and lame and it wasn't even a good play on words, but Chat Noir would have at least snickered so Marinette busted out into another fit of sobs. Hermes rocked her back and forth; the same way Luke or Travis would do whenever she'd get homesick as a child and start crying for her maman. 

When she quited down and her sobs had turned to sniffles Hermes lead them to a bench just a few feet away. "There's a way, I'm not supposed to say."

"Another way? A another way for what?" Tikki zipped out and into the open uncaring, her cheeks puffed out and indignant.

"No—she's you're daughter!" Tikki snapped. Hermes expressed darkened.

"She's capable—"

"So was Orpheus!" Marinette blinked. She understood. Like she was taught about the revolution in History class, at camp she was taught the myths because to mortals they were just tall-tales, but to her— to the other demigods —they were epic retelling's of things that had actually happened. Famed siblings engraved in history. The story of Orpheus and his lover Eurydice had been one of those Chiron had taught.

Orpheus had been a demigod— son of Apollo —and he had loved a mortal woman Eurydice more than anything. He had loved her more then Echo loved Narcissus or Narcissus had loved himself. More than Paris had loved Helen; more anyone had ever loved someone else before. But she had died unexpectedly, and in his moment of grief a god— Chiron never says who when he teaches the story, Will Solace likes to think it was their father who cared enough to come down from Olympus and urge the musician in the name of love —came to him. It was there the god told the demigod that Hades, god of the underworld, Lord of the dead, could be swayed to look the other way if Orpheus wanted to bring his wife back up to the land of the living for a price.

And of course Orpheus— who loved his wife more than the air he needed to breath —with his lyre in hand descended into the underworld and played a song for the god. And the god, swayed by the demigods music allowed him to lead his wife out of the underworld as long as he didn't look at her before they left the underworlds boundaries. He had. Orpheus, unable to hear Eurydice's footsteps, begins fearing that Hades had fooled him and turned, only a few feet from the underworlds exit. Eurydice had in fact been behind him, only to than be trapped in Hades forever.

Chrion always ended the story there, he never told them what had happened to Orpheus. Mr. D had though, Michael Conner, before his death, had asked the god what became of Orpheus; _'He died.'_ the god had told them, there was a soft note in his voice, one that none of the campers had ever heard before, _'He exited the underworld and knew that Hades would never give him a second chance so he sat down at the opening and started to play his lyre.'_ Mr. D doesn't need to tell them how heartbreaking the song is, he doesn't need to comment on it because the kids listening can see it in the Gods eyes even a few thousand years after it'd been strummed. _'Calling for death so he and Eurydice could be together. And so my father, having heard it struck him down with a bolt of lighting.'_

"I can save Adrien," Marinette whispered. 

"No, Marinette going to the underworld never works out!" Tikki hissed.

"It did for Percy and Annabeth; they've been there a dozen times." Annabeth was older than her but she had followed Luke around in the years before everything had happened and it was there, in the stands of the arena that the pair had grown close. Annabeth was the cool older sister that Marinette was lucky enough to technically be able to call her cousin. And after every adventure the blonde girl would retell what had happened to Marinette because the young girl had had stars in her eyes. Annabeth was cool and smart and _'One day I wanna be like you!'_

"It doesn't work out for Miraculous users." Marinette looked at her kwami.

"I'm not just a Miraculous user though." She was a demigod. Tikki looked at her chosen with a for longed expression on her tiny face.

"Please don't do this Marinette, Plagg and I, and the others, we can't go with you into another gods domain, you'll be on your own." Marinette cupped the Kwami and Hermes looked at his daughter— she could feel his burning stare settle on the beauty mark she had under her eye —and she sighed.

"I've been training for stuff like this since I was six, with or without you Tikki I'm bringing Adrien back." Marinette couldn't bring herself to lie and say she was sorry.

**...**

Marinette doesn't tell her mother or father— she knows that there's a very real possibility that she won't be coming back and she knows her maman and papa will beg her to stay, that they'll cry and plead and she knows she can't handle that —she dose however tell Nino. At close to two in the morning in her Ladybug suit and with the Miraculous box in her hand Marinette climbs through Nino Lahiffe's window.

Marinette Dupain-Cheng met Nino the first day back from camp, she had been climbing a tree in the park near her house because the other kids in cabin eleven had told her it was best to stay trained just in case a monster attacked or a god or goddess needed you help, and she had fallen. Right onto the new boy on the block. She had broken her arm in four different places and dislocated his shoulder and while usually that's when people stop being friends with someone, the next day, with Chebakia, Morrican sesame spice cookies in his good hand, Nino had shown up on the Dupain-Cheng doorstep wondering if Marinette could play.

"Ladybug!" He gasps, Adriens favorite Jagged Stone song is playing from Ninos phone and his glasses and hat are off— Marinette knows he's been crying —"Is there an akuma?" He wipes his face with the inside of his wrist and Ladybug's own lip quivers. 

"No but Nino I do need your help." Nino puts his glasses on and though he doesn't flip his phone to stop the music he lowers the volume so that it's a whisper.

"Anything," Nino tells her. He doesn't hesitate in offering his help despite the fact he's hurting.

"Spots off." A burst of pink light illuminates the room and suddenly Nino Lahiffe isn't looking at Ladybug anymore, he's looking at his childhood friend.

"Marinette?" Tikki dives into the large backpack she's slung over her shoulder but Nino doesn't take notice to the canvas bag or the kwami and instead continues to gape at his friend.

"Hey Nino," her hands wring her sweaters hem nervously.

"I-you're-" he falls back onto his bed, "This makes sense. You're always running off during akuma attacks and wow, okay this is defiantly better than the alternative."

"What was the alternative?"

"You were Mayura and were helping Hawkmoth cause he was like Jagged Stone or something."

"What? No gods—really that was a theory?" Nino shrugged.

"Someone posted it on the Ladyblog a while back, Alya took it off—but fuck Nette, Ladybug? You can get hurt!" Nino was always the more expressive; his eyes always said what he didn't. I don't want to lose anymore friends.

"I'm going to bring Adrien back," Marinette said. 

"Adrien's dead, we buried him this morning."

"I know but Nino I need him okay? I can't be Ladybug— be me —if he's not there."

"He was Chat Noir?" Marinette nods. She places the Miraculous box on his bed. "I need you to watch this—watch my earrings for me tonight." Nino looks at her with narrowed eyes, with a suspicious look and posed lips.

"Why? You've had sleepovers at Alya's and stuff, you can leave that home," he tells her, she gives him a bland look. It's almost pitying and Nino has to turn away.

"Because I don't know if I'll come back."

"Than don't do it—"

"—I love him Nino," Marinette cuts him off, "I love him so much that I can't breath without him by my side. I can bring him back, I know I can, so how can you ask me not to?"

"Because I can't loose two friends Nette."

"You won't."

"You don't know that." She doesn't and it's the truth. She had no idea she can somehow sway Hades— she has no musical talent to speak of —and she had no idea if she can make it past the ferryman and the river Styx and Cerberus and she had no idea if a monster will kill her at the opening, but she knows she can't not try. She knows she can't live without knowing she gave it her all. She knows she can't live without Chat Noir by her side.

"No, but I need you to trust me, okay? Trust I'll come back with Adrien and everything will be okay." Nino bit his lip, his teeth scrapped against the flesh of it, tearing away at the top layer of skin.

"You'll come back in the morning?"

"Before you leave for school."

"Why me?" He wondered, "Why not Alya?"

"Because when we were eight and you found that box under my bed—" the box had pictures of camp, of her and her siblings and friends, the dagger Luke had long ago given her "—And you asked what all that was I couldn't tell you, you didn't press me for answers. You told me I could tell you when I was ready."

Nino pulled Marinette into a bone crushing hug, he held her there, against his chest, tightly and breathed in her sent because he knew it could be for the last time. She smelled like bread and chocolate and burnt crust and icing. She smelled of the Dupain-Cheng bakery; of his home away from home. 

"Come back to me okay? No matter what come back," he said thickly, emotion suffocating his words. He didn't bother to blink away the tears that had glossed over his eyes. 

"I'll do everything I can okay?" No, it wasn't okay because it wasn't a promise but Nino released her anyway. 

...

The gods moved west but sometimes they left things behind. Like the forgotten toy a child leaves when their family moves sometimes when expanding west the Gods forget a flying horse two, or to remind the cyclops working in the Mediatrian armory that they should move to the Gulf Coast because no one lived in Europe anymore; and most importantly to close the openings to the underworld that still resided in Paris.

Hidden with the help of the mist, at the base of the Saint Jacques Tower in the middle of Paris laid what looked like a stairwell, leading to what a mortal would assume was the sixteenth century churches cellar. In truth the old stone stair case descended to one of the many parts of the underworld. Annabeth had once decided the waiting room at DOA records to be the demigod version of a dentists office. Hermes had described this way down to the underworld as a real life look into Dantes Inferno. 

Readjusting the straps of her bag, and with her dagger in her hand and the weight of her earrings gone from her lobes Marinette breathed in sharply as she looked down at the staircase, a red ominous light shinning back up at her. Her heart beat erratically in her chest and everything in her body told her to run, that nothing but danger laid ahead— demigods are diagnosed with ADHD because they can't sit still, Travis had told her it was because of her battle instincts ready to kick in at any moment —but she didn't. Instead she stormed forward, alert, ready to take on Zeus himself if he so tried to stop her.

Marinette wasn't sure how long it took for her to reach the bottom of the staircase; she couldn't see the top anymore and what had been Paris's city lights had vanished from her view whenever she looked back long ago. The floor was a dusty stone and the walls had been smoothed over, no stalagmites hung from the ceiling and instead old still lit oil lamps did. The light coming from the lamp wasn't red and as Marinette looked around she wasn't quite sure where the red light she had seen from above had come from. 

"And who are you?" Marinette jumped with a squeak at the sound of a low voice. With her dagger raised she spun only to be met with a tall man in an expensive Italian suit. He was gaunt looking and incredibly pale and almost translucent looking. 

"I-you're Charon," Marinette holstered her dagger in the pocket of her pants. 

"You're a demigod," he observed, he spoke with a second-hand British accent, one he had obviously picked up when England had been center of the world. "Why are you using this old entrance, do you know how long it look me to get over here from Los Angles?" 

"Uh-no, I don't I'm sorry sir," she apologized; Marinette knew time moved the same in the underworld as it did in the realm of the living so, perhaps, the Ladybug themed hero theorized, the staircase was like Narina. 

"No one's called me sir in nearly a century," Charon said, peering down his nose at her.

"I can't let you in if you're living though, manners or not."

"But I'm not!" Marinette lied, she hated liars with a passion— probably because growing up half her siblings were compulsive liars with sticky fingers and a penchant for playing pranks —but she was a child of Hermes which meant she was as good a liar as they came. "I'm dead."

"Than why did you come through here? all souls are to go through the Los Angeles office."

"I was playing around with a spell my brother showed me, it was an out of body spell— I wanted to see if the boy I liked like me back —only by the time I'd made it back to my body..." Marinette trailed off, "I hadn't realized the time and by the time I got back it was the day of my funeral."

"You have a rut sack and dagger with you." She did.

"My brothers and sisters always told me to be prepared." That wasn't a lie, Travis, Conner, Luke and her sisters Julia and Alice had always stressed that to survive as a demigod she always needed to be ready to run at a moments notice, that if she wanted to make it out of lycee with all her limbs still intact than she couldn't ever leave the house without her dagger or ambrosia squares or anything else she could possibly need in an emergency.

Charon tilted his head up at her, "You wouldn't happen to have payment would you?" The ferryman held out an open palm. Marinette reached into her rut sacks side pocket and pulled out a dozen golden dracmas, the demigod placed them in the gods hand.

The ferryman had no eyebrows though if he did, with the way he looked between the gold and her, Marinette suspected that he would have.

"Daughter of Hermes I presume?" He wondered, impishly Marinette smiled.

"Better than that Jackson boy, come along and word of the wise madame," Charon offered as he began to lead her down the stone tunnel, "If anyone asks continue to lie. Lie about your name—" Marinette had been taught when she'd gotten to camp that names have power, it's why you called furies the 'Friendly Ones' and never called the gods myths, "—Don't look anybody in their eye." Old oil lamps, as they got deeper, seemed to transform into florescent lights.

"Sir," Marinette wondered, "Why can't I look anyone in their eyes?"Marinette asked, when they went up a short set up stairs further down the tunnel, the stone beneath their feet turned into lanolium flooring. The smoothed out walls had been painted a cool steely grey.

"Haven't you ever heard? The eyes are the window to the soul." Swallowing the anxious lump in her throat Marinette nodded and continue to walk. They walked in silence for a while, just the thuds of their feet could be heard when Charon, looking back from the corner of his eyes asked, almost knowingly, "So who are you looking for?"

Lying hadn't worked before, he had seen right threw her. "My partner, Chat Noir—err, Adrien Agreste."

"He made noise when he got here," Charon said. "Mortal children, demigods who don't know yet, they're usually unprepared to die. Most of the times we stick an added expense to a bill, an American Express car or Version Bill or something but children don't have such luxury so usually they're stuck waiting in the lobby with me for a few centuries."

"But not Adrien?" Marinette quirked an eyebrow.

"No, Lord Hades directed me to let him pass the moment he stepped through the lobby. He said it was because of the noise the other children had been making."

"What do you think?"

"I don't presume to know what goes on in the Lord of the Dead's head, but if I did."

"Oh." Right, that would be impertinent. 

"I never said I didn't know what went on in his heart," Charon told her with a sly grin. It looked odd on his face, as if his face muscles weren't used to such an action, "Lord Hades and myself, we don't like letting heroes sit around, it's not right to leave them on the rivers edge after everything they've done." Marinette smiled kindly up at the god. She got where her brother had come from, where Anabeth and Percy and the others came from— the gods were cold and heartless and cruel and they allowed their children to suffer simply for sufferings sake —but they were also gods and they would weather out all of time and it was moments like these when the gods showed humanity that Marinette knew they weren't all bad. That they couldn't be. 

"Sir?" she wondered after a beat.

"Yes?"

"It's rare for someone to walk out of the underworld, let alone walk out with the person they came to save, right?"

"I think if you're doubting yourself already than the quest has already been lost." Marinettes fingers curled into her palm.

"Right."

They reached a large black door, next to the door frame was a keypad. Charon reached up to typed in a number when he turned and looked over his shoulder.

"If you wouldn't mind." It took Marinette a second to figure out that he wanted her to turn around; blushing she did. She heard the beeps as Charon typed in the numbers— four-two-four-two-five-six-four —and the green light above the keypad beeped loudly as the door hissed open. Charon, like the gentlemen he'd more often than not once observed, opened the door and stepped aside to allow Marinette through.

DOA recording studio was just like Annabeth had described. Muzak played softly on hidden speakers. The carpet and walls were steel gray and the furniture was black leather, and every seat was taken; people— spirits; Marinette could see through them —sat on the couches, some people stood up against the walls and others stood aimlessly throughout the lobby. Others— Ghouls, Marinette recognized from her training at camp — waited the elevator. Nobody moved, or talked, or did much of anything. No one spoke or moved or did much of anything. 

Cacti in the shape of skeleton hands grew up from the floor; Persephone without a doubt had tried to do something to lived the place up.

"Come along daughter of Hermes," Charon said, he lead Marinette towards the elevator and it was then the spirits in the room seemed to converge on the two of them. The pair of them pushed through the crowd of waiting spirits. The spirits grabbed at their clothes like the wind, their voices whispering things Marinette couldn't make out. Charon grumbling, shoved them out of the way.

"Freeloaders." He escorted Marinette into the elevator, which was already crowded with souls of the dead, each one holding a green boarding pass. Marinette tucked her hands deep into her pockets. Grabbing two spirits who were trying to get on with, Charon, pushed them back into the lobby.

"Right. Now, no one get any ideas while I'm gone," he announced to the waiting room. "And if anyone moves the dial off my easy-listening station again, I'll make sure you're here for another thousand years. Understand?"

With that the elevator doors shut. As the elevator as a lessuirly speed descended Marinette, getting dizzy, gripped onto the elevators wall when suddenly the elevator stopped, the air turned misty and the spirits around her started changing shape. Their modern clothes flickered, turning into gray hooded robes. The floor of the elevator began swaying.The elevator had started moving forward. Trying to shake off her nausea Marinette squeezed her eyes tight, only to find, when she opened her eyes, that Charon's creamy Italian suit had been replaced by a long black robe. His tortoiseshell glasses were gone, showing that where his eyes should've been were empty sockets.

"Yes?" He turned to Marinette. The elevator kept swaying.

"Nothing," she laughed nervously. The flesh of his face was becoming transparent, letting Marinette to see straight through to his skull. The elevator kept swaying and Marinette knew Charon wouldn't be please if she threw up all over her robes so once more she shut her eyes. When she opened them the elevator wasn't an elevator anymore. She and Charon and the rest of the spirits were standing in a wooden barge.

Charon was poling them all across a dark, oily river, swirling with bones, dead fish, and other, stranger things plastic dolls, crushed car-nations, soggy diplomas with gilt edges. Annabeth had told her River Styx had become polluted, that it was nothing like what they were told in the stories but still, to see the great river reduced to being a Seine look alike, it broke her heart. Charon caught Marinette mournful look at the river.

"For thousands of years, you humans have been throwing in everything as you come across-hopes, dreams, wishes that never came true. Irresponsible waste management, if you ask me."

"Who's in charge of waste management?" Marinette wondered.

"Lucius Tarquinius." Marinette raised a brow. "He was the Roman Emperor who started sewage systems, why no one will replace him is beyond me." Mist curled off the filthy water. Above us, almost lost in the gloom, was a ceiling of stalactites. Ahead, the far shore glimmered with greenish light, the color of poison. The shoreline of the Underworld came into view. Craggy rocks and black volcanic sand stretched inland about a hundred yards to the base of a high stone wall, which marched off in either direction as far as anybody could see. A sound came from somewhere nearby in the green gloom, echoing off the stones-the howl of a large animal.

"Old Three-Face is hungry," Charon said. His smile turned almost skeletal in the greenish light. "Bad luck for you daughter of Hermes."

"My father's protector of the lucky," Marinette breathed. 

"Only one god matters down here godling," Charon said, Marinette, not thinking corrected him.

"Five."

"What?"

"Hades, Persephone, Demeter, you and Thanatos," she said listing them off on her fingers, "Five."

Charon just looked at her as the bottom of the boat slid onto the black sand. The dead began to disembark. A woman holding a little girl's hand, an old man and an old woman hobbling along arm in arm. A boy no older than Marinette was, shuffled all silently along in their gray robes.

"You're kinder than most godlings," Charon said. "I hope you and your mortal boy make it out, if not perhaps Lord Hades will let you work up in the lobby with me."

"That's certainly be a better fate than most get." With that Charon took up his pole. He warbled something that sounded like a Barry Manilow song as he ferried the empty barge back across the river. Marinette turned and caught sight of the tail end of spirits and raced to catch up with them only to stop at the gates.

Marinette knew what to expect, she'd known what the Underworld looked like for years, but seeing and hearing are two different things. The howling of the hungry animal was really loud now; the three-headed dog, Cerberus, who was supposed to guard Hades's door, was nowhere to be seen.

There were three separate entrances under one huge black archway that read YOU ARE NOW ENTERING EREBUS, each entrance had a pass-through metal detector with security cameras mounted on top and razor wire on the top of each gate, there to seemingly stop any spirit talented enough to get on top of the fifteen foot gate. Beyond that there were tollbooths manned by black-robed ghouls like Charon.

The dead queued up in the three lines, two marked ATTENDANT ON DUTY, and one marked EZ DEATH. The EZ DEATH line was moving right along; the other two were crawling. The EZ DEATH's more than likely lead to the Asphodel Fields, unlike any other area of the underworld the fields had no judges and so anyone that chose to go were welcomed.

It was at that moment, as Marinette surveyed the lines that a couple of black-robbed ghouls had pulled aside one spirit and were frisking him at the security desk. The man started to whimper and shake his head; Marinette turned away. If Hades had decided that the man deserved special punishment than who was she to interfere? She was on the Gods home terf, looking for a favor anyway, going against him wouldn't win her any favor.

As Marinette got closer to the gates the howling was so loud now it shook the ground at her feet, but no matter how much the ground shook she couldn't place where the dog was, Annabeth had told her about the dog though; about how it blended in with whatever was behind it until it moved. And then, about fifty feet in front of her, the green mist that had rolled off the lake shimmered. Standing just where the path split into three lanes was an enormous shadowy monster.

Looking straight at her was a large, three headed purebred rottweiler twice the size of any mammoth Marinette had seen in a museum; only it's three dozen sharp, plaque covered teeth and six dark eyes seemed to be solid. 

The dead, with no fear at all, walked right up to the dog and walked between his front paws and under his large belly, the attendants lines parted on either side of him. As Marinette got closer Cerberus became to get less and less translucence. The middle head snarled at Marinette who took her bag off her back and pulled out a rubber ball she'd brought for him; the box her father had been carrying before sat at the bottom of the sack.

Holding out the bright pink rubber ball she'd bought from petsmart Cerberus looked at her in awe. All three of his heads cocked sideways. Six nostrils dilated.

"Want the ball boy?" She asked in a high pitched and cherry voice. "Want it?" Cerberus's tail thumped excitedly. Marinette turned away from the river and towards where the shore seemed to go on endlessly. She threw the ball and Cerberus chased after it; attendants, shouting for Cerberus to come back, began to run after the large dog and so Marinette took her chance and in a calm manner, walked through the EZ DEATH line what had come to a standstill at the lack of attendants. 

**...**

Jagged Stone and Tom Dupain had known each other for years, long before Jagged had become Jagged and her father had even met her mother so it was safe to say Marinette had grown up going to the rockstars concerts, but even that and a Clara Nightingale concert and a football match packed with a million fans wouldn't match the size of the Asphodel Fields. It was as if the lights had gone out; the black grass had been trampled by eons of dead feet blew under a warm, swamp-like breath of wind. Black trees with thick dead leaves that were still attached to the branches grew here and there.

The cavern ceiling was so high above her it might've been a bank of storm clouds, except for the stalactites, which glowed faint gray and looked wickedly pointed. Marinette counted back in ancient greek and tried not to imagine what would happen if they fell on her because they dotted around the fields; several that had fallen and impaled themselves in the black grass. The dead didn't have to fear freak accidents of mother nature.

Marinette tried to blend into the crowd, she kept an eye out for security. She couldn't help it but as she moved through the crowds of the dead she couldn't help but look for familiar faces. Master Fu, who had died of gastrointestinal issues the year before, Mr. Ramier who had suffered a heart attack two years before that, for brothers and sisters and other demigods who just hadn't come back to camp one summer because that was the life of a demi.

But the dead are hard to look at.

Their faces shimmer. They all look slightly angry or confused. They come up to you and speak, but their voices sound like chatter, like bats twittering and once they realize you can't understand them, they frown and move away.

The dead aren't scary. They're just sad.

Marinette continued to move forward, following the line of newly arrived dead that snaked from the main gates to a black tented pavilion with a banner that read: JUDGMENTS FOR ELYSIUM AND ETERNAL DAMNATION! Welcome, Newly Deceased!

Out the back of the tent came two much smaller lines. To the left, spirits flanked by security ghouls were marched down a rocky path toward the Fields of Punishment, which glowed and smoked in the distance, a vast, cracked wasteland with rivers of lava and minefields and miles of barbed wire separating the different torture areas. Even from far away, Marinette could see people being chased by hell hounds, burned at the stake, forced to run naked through cactus patches or listen to opera music. She could, from where she stood, just make out a tiny hill, with the ant-size figure of Sisyphus struggling to move his boulder to the top.

There were other things— things to horrible to describe —that she could hear and see from the punishment, but she continued to move forward. She knew she'd see them in future nightmears so why dwell on it now when she had all the time in the world to hyperventalate in her bed next to Tikki and Adrien because that's what she was there to do. Save Adrien, her kitty.

The line coming from the right side of the judgment pavilion was much better. This one led down toward a small valley surrounded by walls-a gated community, which seemed to be the only happy part of the Underworld. Beyond the security gate were neighborhoods of beautiful houses from every time period in history, Roman villas and medieval castles and Victorian mansions. Silver and gold flowers bloomed on the lawns. The grass rippled in rainbow colors. She could hear laughter and smell barbecue cooking. Elysium.

Adrien was there, Marinette knew it. Everything in her told her that he was there— that everyone she loved and had lost —was there. In the middle of that valley was a glittering blue lake, with three small islands like a vacation resort in the Bahamas. The Isles of the Blest, for people who had chosen to be reborn three times, and three times achieved Elysium. Marinette knew that was where she wanted to go; that when she did really die she'd shoot for a second time and a time after that until she could call the Isle her home.

Marinette left the judgment pavilion and moved deeper into the Asphodel Fields. It got darker. The colors faded from her clothes. The crowds of chattering spirits began to thin. After a few miles of walking, we began to hear a familiar screech in the distance. Looming on the horizon was a palace of glittering black obsidian. Above the parapets swirled three dark batlike creatures: the Furies. I got the feeling they were waiting for her.

High in the gloom. The outer walls of the fortress glittered black, and the two-story-tall bronze gates stood wide open.  
  
Up close, Marinette saw that the engravings on the gates were scenes of death. Some were from modern times; an atomic bomb exploding over a city, a trench filled with gas mask-wearing soldiers, a line of African famine victims waiting with empty bowls-but all of them looked as if they'd been etched into the bronze thousands of years ago. Annabeth hadn't told her about this, Marinette wondered if she was looking at prophecies that had come true.

Inside the courtyard was the strangest garden she had ever seen; Marinette knew who it belonged too and kept walking, though as she did her eyes kept glittering around to each and ever strange plant. Multicolored mushrooms, poisonous shrubs, and weird luminous plants grew without sunlight. Precious jew-els made up for the lack of flowers, piles of rubies as big as my fist, clumps of raw diamonds. Standing here and there like frozen party guests were statues- petrified children, satyrs, and centaurs-all smiling grotesquely.

In the center of the garden was an orchard of pomegranate trees, their orange blooms neon bright in the dark. The tart smell of those pomegranates was almost overwhelming. Marinette, though she'd filled up before she had left home, had a sudden desire to eat them, which was wrong because she knew the story. One bite of Underworld food, and we would never be able to leave. 

Marinette walked up the steps of the palace, between black columns, through a black marble portico, and into the house of Hades. The entry hall had a polished bronze floor, which seemed to boil in the reflected torchlight. There was no ceiling, just the cavern roof, far above. Every side doorway was guarded by a skeleton in military gear. Some wore Greek armor, some British redcoat uniforms, some camouflage with tattered American flags on the shoulders. They carried spears or muskets or M-16s. None of them bothered her, but their hollow eye sockets followed her as we walked down the hall, toward the big set of doors at the opposite end.

Two U.S. Marine skeletons guarded the doors. They grinned down at us, rocket-propelled grenade launchers held across their chests. A hot wind blew down the corridor, and the doors swung open. The guards stepped aside and at the end of the room, in his throne, sat Hades.

He wasn't the first god she had met, and it wasn't even Marinette's first time seeing him but it was the first time Marinette had ever felt like she was truly in the presence of a god. He was at least ten feet tall, and dressed in black silk robes and a crown of braided gold. His skin was albino white, his hair shoulder-length and jet black. He wasn't bulked up like Ares was, but he radiated power. He lounged on his throne of fused human bones, looking lithe, graceful, and dangerous as a panther. Hades had the same intense eyes, the same kind of mesmerizing, evil charisma.

"You are brave to come here, Daughter of Hermes," he said in an oily voice. "Very brave."

Marinette felt as though she should say thank you but at that moment her mouth didn't seem to work. Numbness crept into her joints, tempting her to lie down and just take a little nap at Hades's feet. Curl up there and sleep forever.

She fought the feeling and stepped forward. She knew what she had to say. "Lord and Uncle, I come with a request."

Hades raised an eyebrow. When he sat forward in his throne, shadowy faces appeared in the folds of his black robes, faces of torment, as if the garment were stitched of trapped souls from the Fields of Punishment, trying to get out. She wasn't sure if it was the ADHD part of her, or the aspiring fashion designer in her what wanted her to ask; she didn't but part of her wanted to.

"A request?" Hades said, his eyes sparkled knowingly. Marinette glanced at the empty, smaller throne next to Hades's. It was shaped like a black flower, gilded with gold. It was empty though.

"Yes my lord."

"Very well Ladybug, what is it?"

"I want-please allow me to leave the underworld with the soul of Adrien Agreste."

"That's a pretty heavy request," Hades remarked. 

"Please sir, I'll do whatever you require me to do if you let me take Adrien back to the land of the living."

"Anything?" Hades mused. "What if I wanted to steal my nephews lyre? Or a pair of your fathers winged shoes, or my brothers weapons? Would you steal from the gods to get your partner back?" _Would you steal from me?_ Was what was really asked. _Would you sneak into Elysium and steal his soul no matter the answer I give you? Would you defy the gods for him._

"Yes." It was an easier answer to give than she thought, she would do whatever she needed to bring him back.

Hades leaned back in his thrown. 

"I won't make you steal from the gods, but I will need something, I can't just let you take his soul and walk away. It'd be bad for business."

"I understand my Lord, and I stand by what I say."

"Yes, yes anything," Hades waved his hand, he used his other hand to stroke his beard. He hummed for a moment. "How do you feel about this boy?" Hades wondered, "No one goes through all of this just for their partner, you know."

"I love him, I'm in love with him."

"And you would do anything for him."

"Yes."

"There's a package in your bag, what's in it?"

"Oh-I don't-I haven't looked at it yet sir." Marinette said.

"A god gives you a present and you don't tear into it?" Hades chuckled. "You're funnier than Grace or Jackson for sure—open it up, I want to see it."

Marinette did as she was told, she kneeled on the ground and placed her bag in front of her and pulled out the package her father had been carrying when he saw out after the funeral and opened it.

Laying inside the package were three things; two pearl like beads and a single golden apple.

Nostalgia gripped Marinettes stomach because she knew where her father had gotten the apple— she had been at camp when Luke, with a fresh scar on his face and thunderous eyes arrived back at camp —and she picked it up to hold out for Hades to inspect. With long gaunt like fingers the God of the Dead plucked the apple from Marinettes hold and held it up to the light. 

"My wife loves these, did you know? It's the one thing she can't grow, she can make money grow on trees but she can't grow this." He held the apple close to his chest. "This," he said, "I'll allow you to take the mortal for this."

"Thank you," Marinette breathed, "Thank you my lord."

"Dupain-Cheng," Hades told her, "This won't happen again, if he dies a second time cat themed hero or not he won't get seven more times."

"I understand sir." 

"Peter!" Hades shouted at a booming volume, a zombie boy appeared, wearing newsey themed clothing appeared, his left arm grotesque and dislocated, his skin a blueish color and one eye missing, "Bring Adrien Agreste from Elysium."

"Yes my Lord," the zombie boy Peter bowed, his arm dragged behind him as he left the palace.

"Dupain-Cheng, would you really have stolen from my brothers if I so ordered you too?"

"Yes."

"I expect that answer from a daughter of Aphrodite but you, a daughter of Hermes?"

"We all have our fatal flaws, sir," Marinette mused. Hades' tongue darted out and licked his lips and nodded.

"What do you think he would do for you? What will he do when you die?" Because she would more than likely be dead in another fifteen years. Twenty if she was lucky, five or ten if she wasn't.

"I don't know, he's a mortal." He'll grieve and move on just as all mortals do.

"Mortals are funny like that, we— us gods and their children —are stuck, when something like this happens you come down here trying to bargain and when something like this happens to someone we love we turn them into a tree or a lake, immortalizing them, but mortals? They shake it off."

Marinette hears their feet before they appear, she's there, looking at the doorway expectingly when they arrive. 

In the blue scarf she knit for him and his favorite sweater, with familiarly styled hair Adrien Agreste froze in the doorway of Hades throne room.

"My lady?" He breathed.

"Chat." and she ran, he'd only managed to take a few steps forward when she leaped into his arms, her arms wound tightly around his neck as his held her tight around the waist; her feet dangled over the floor. Their foreheads touched, tears— fat hot tears of happiness —welled up in Marinettes eyes and she didn't bother to hold them back.

"Why are you here bugaboo?" He asked softly, his eyes still closed and refusing toilet her go; though Adrien did put her down on the ground. He knew he was dead, all the spirits did. 

"I've come to bring you home kitty."

"Yeah?" Marinette nodded, she intertwined their hands and stepped back from Adrien towards where the box with the pearls laid. She lead him to the box; without having to ask him he shouldered her empty bag, and she handed him a pearl. She turned to Hades with a grateful look on her face.

"Thank you," she said.

"There's no thanks needed, we made a deal."

"Thank you for hearing me out my Lord," Marinette bowed, she turned to Adrien, who looked at Hades— really looked at Hades in a way mortals couldn't do —and tightened his grip on Marinette's hand.

"Think Ninos room and crush the pearl, okay? That's where we have to go first."

"Nino—why?"

"I'll explain it all when we're home okay?"

"Okay and my Lady?"

"Yeah?" Adrien placed the pearl in the pocket of his sweater and kissed her. Still holding her hand Adrien used his free hand to cup her cheek. She placed her palm flat against the side of his neck; she couldn't feel the pulse in his neck but she would, the next time they kissed she would be able too. 

The kiss was firm and the kind of kiss you give your partner after a long day at the office only to find that the house had been cleaned and dinner had been made and the dishes had been done; it was the kind of kiss that reaffirmed the love two people had. 

When he pulled back, Marinettes eyes were still closed.

"I love you Marinette."

"And I'm in love with you Adrien.


End file.
